A lot of nice PR talk, to cover the tremendously intransparent, rigid, bureaucratic, top-down, uncreative culture.
Arbeitsatmosphäre
After the forced return to the office, a layoffs round that not only decimated us, but also was a hanging threat over all our heads for many months, and a salary round that basically given inflation amounts to a big reduction, I'd say the atmosphere has never been worse.
Kommunikation
The last 2 years have been a disaster. First the whole intransparent handling of coming back to the office, with mixed, misleading, some times aggressive communication, to just switch it on the last moment to something more relaxed (depending on team).
Then the whole story with the layoffs, where we were basically told we are going to be decimated because "complexity", and we didn't get any more clarity than that for about half a year.
And at the end of this, a salary round, that based on current inflation rates amounts to a very big pay-cut, without any information on why this is so bad, just colleagues asking each other, and looking in disbelief at the numbers.
Kollegenzusammenhalt
People come and go. A few nice moments if there's alcohol involved, but even that (the parties & events) is a shadow of its past self, and clearly team building and bonding is not a priority.
Work-Life-Balance
Less people, less salary, always a heavy meeting culture, but targets have to be reached. For people that can manage the stress, it can be ok, but this is very mixed and I've seen colleagues work on vacation, or on parental leave. I know this isn't "forced" directly, but it doesn't seem to be completely unwanted either.
Vorgesetztenverhalten
Middle management seems to be the unfortunate punch bags, that receive tremendous pressure from higher management, and then most often try to soften it a bit, but still apply it on their directs.
Interessante Aufgaben
Few and far between. Mostly a feature factory
Umgang mit älteren Kollegen
Not that many of them, and the pressuring atmosphere doesn't seem to be the best for people that may (want to) have a full family life. Also, the way we work, I can't easily imagine someone on my team, being close to retirement age
Umwelt-/Sozialbewusstsein
Lots of green washing for sure, but come on, this is the fashion industry, one of the dirtiest and most polluting ones on the planet.
Gehalt/Sozialleistungen
There was an attempt to match market rates last year. This year, with raging inflation, and ridiculously low raises, we are again very low.
Not much in the way of benefits either (the biggest one, the discount, is becoming less and less relevant, since it doesn't apply for partner sold products which are becoming fast the majority)